


may the moon smile again

by komorykatt



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Character Study, M/M, Mutual Pining, POV Alternating, POV First Person, idk kids are sad. but poetically, kinda like a thought journal through azure moon???
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-05
Updated: 2019-10-05
Packaged: 2020-11-23 23:02:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,470
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20897570
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/komorykatt/pseuds/komorykatt
Summary: How I long to reach for your hand, bloodied as it may be, but it ever falls away from mine.You will never reach back so long as your fingers are curled around your lance, poised for the head of false salvation.





	may the moon smile again

**Author's Note:**

> for three days and three nights i was possessed by a malignant spirit overtaking my body, writing this fic in a blind, enlightened frenzy, unable to stop until this raw emotional beast was finally tamed. i've become a shell of a person, no traces of who i once was left behind. i miss my family.
> 
> i just wanted to write some normal dimilix pining

It has been some time since Felix last looked me in the eye. Longer still since he has spoken my name. Whenever we meet, an onslaught of foul words tumble from his mouth, calling me a boar, a beast, an animal... So many cruel, resentful names are tossed about, but I can't deny any of them. He seems to hate that part the most, and never stays long after they're said.

He comes and goes, a tide of animosity crashing over me and washing out just as suddenly as he arrived, spitting how he can't stand the sight of me before he's gone again.

All I find myself thinking is _ what changed? _ I know the answer well, but still I chase it like a dog chases its tail. Chasing and chasing in hopes a different solution might appear, one that I can actually fulfill. What changed, what can I do to make things right again, how can things go back to the way they once were...? 

How can I make him look at me with the same eyes he once did, without casting aside the ghosts that lurk behind mine?

*****

I can't stand the sight of him. Everywhere I turn he's there, wanting to talk to me, acting as though things are the same as they always were. It's disgusting. 

I won't let him get near me, not when I know his true nature. He's just a raging boar, a bloodthirsty beast that dwells behind the face of a noble prince. No one else sees it, but I know better than anyone what he really is. I'm sure they'll figure it out once he finally snaps and bares his teeth at the rest of them.

It's not my problem. I turn my head away from the writhing animal, refusing to look at the face it wears.

It hurts too much to meet his gaze.

*****

I try to speak to him, to find a way to spend even a fraction of time with him again. He listens a moment, sometimes even two. The spiny guard he puts up never quite lowers, but sometimes I can catch a glimpse of my old friend peeking through the cracks. A faint glimmer of the old Felix flickers for just an instant, like a mirage dancing upon the desert winds. 

He notices it as well, always, and he recoils without fail. The fleeting smile caught on his face contorts with anger as he banishes that dying light back to the pit of his soul, and then he turns away with a lash of words crueler still. I'm left standing, staring at his back as it disappears around the corner, wondering if what I saw was ever even there to begin with, or if it was just another of my ghosts. 

*****

The boar is dangerous, make no mistake of that. He's an animal, a ruthless killer who could spill the blood of hundreds and relish every second of it. Even if no one else believes it, I know what I saw. He's nothing more than a monster who hides his disgusting maw behind the mask of a long dead prince.

But that mask is too real at times, too easy to believe in. That smiling face and those kind words spoken with such sincerity... I still catch myself slipping up sometimes. He just makes it too damn easy to forget about the things I've seen, and for a split second to believe that ** _Dimitri_ ** is still in there. I have to stay away from him, before I wind up falling to his tricks like everyone else has. 

I could leave, join another class and never have to look at that boar again. But it's no use, I'm drawn back to him time and time again by a thread I can't sever. I can't escape him, I can't turn my back on him.

All I can do is look the other way. 

*****

The headaches grow worse, their voices screaming louder.

I see Felix pass me by, but his form flickers and changes, warping into the visage of Glenn. I can hardly believe my eyes but he's there for sure, circling me like a starving shark would its prey, begging for more, more, always more. The cries for vengeance have pounded in the back of my mind for years just the same, but this time I will listen to them, my soul bared to their words. 

He's right. This can go on no longer. Something must be done, and I must be the one to do it. For their sake.

Glenn's voice whirls around me, and Father's, and Stepmother's, and everyone, everyone speaking too loudly at once until my ears bleed and my skull caves.

Felix passes by and spits his insults at me just as he does any other day, but I can hardly hear his voice beneath his brother's.

*****

His mask is slipping. Every day he's growing further from that ideal prince he pretends to be and closer to the beast I saw rampage two years ago. He's snapping, and those bloodthirsty words he keeps under lock and key are starting to run loose, spilling past tight lips for everyone to hear. They're starting to see it too, starting to see that I was right all those times I tried to warn them, but there's no joy in being right.

I wanted to be wrong. 

He's a danger to himself, I've seen it with my own eyes. The way he's begun to swing his lance around like a mindless brute, having long since discarded any regard for his own life. All that training he's kept up day in and day out is for nothing when he fights like a crazed animal. 

Something twists in my stomach when I think about how easily an enemy can break his defenses when he's like this. The fountain of blood that would rain down should they take him up on one of his many openings, and the broken body that would drop the same as any other on the battlefield... The feeling wells up in my throat, making it hard to breathe. He's going to charge at the enemy in a vengeful fit, fully prepared to die trying.

And I can't stop him. 

The thread draws my eyes to him, and all I can do is watch as the ghosts drag him under.

*****

I must avenge them, no matter who I must cut down, no matter who stands in my way. No matter what the cost, I will. I will, I will, I swear I will… 

*****

Cage him, lock him away. Quickly, quickly, before he gets himself killed! You've got to do something, or he'll—

*** * ***

**Like the sun chasing the moon, the two will never meet. **

_ **The thread snaps.** _

*** * ***

*** ***

*****

They told me he was dead. 

Executed for his crimes, for treason against his Kingdom and his own flesh and blood, but I didn't believe it for a second. How could I accept it, how could I possibly accept that he could be gone now too? I wouldn't. Five years I searched, turning over every stone in this damned country in a mad quest to find a dead man. I wouldn't, couldn't believe it until I laid eyes on his body.

When I finally found his corpse it stared through me with a single beady eye, looking past me and straight to the specter that hung on my shoulder. It spoke, such inane blabbering of revenge and bloodlust pouring out of his husk. Our born again Professor stood beside him, watching him with silent remorse, and so too did everyone else who saw this thing left in his place.

He would have been better off dead.

*****

She must be destroyed.

That woman, that vile wretch… The dead will not rest until I offer up her head to the altar of their suffering. They will know no peace until she's gone! Their suffering everlasting, until the day their vengeance is fulfilled at last!

Their pain, their hatred, their regrets linger and cling to me like a ghastly cloak, dragging me down, down, deeper into their graves. I welcome the suffocating grip that pulls me ever closer to them, knowing I deserve the curse they've wrought upon me for nine long years. It is my fault for being the one to survive despite it all.

All I can do is march on, each ghostly hand upon my back pushing me another step forward. For Father, for Stepmother, for Glenn… for Dedue. I will have her head. I will tear down all who oppose, rip out the life from all of those unworthy to possess it and leave a trail of corpses in my wake. I will pile the bodies higher and higher until they touch the heavens, and that woman's will be the blasphemous crown to my mountain.

I will kill her for all of you. I will, I swear it, I will. 

Please, stop looking at me so.

*****

The past can't be undone, but the boar still clings to it. It unravels, tearing at the seams as he holds on to it for dear life, as if the dead are all he has left. As if life has no value, and he has no stake in the affairs of the living. It's disgusting, so pathetic how he won't let go, even as the corpses he devotes himself to threaten to drag him into the grave with them. 

Knowing him, that's probably just what he wants.

No matter how many times I try, speaking to that thing is pointless now. I spit venom at the beast, mocking his reverence for the dead, yelling how insatiable they are and he's a fool to appease them, but he doesn't hear me. He never hears me anymore, he only ever lends an ear to his delusions. They're all that matter to him now.

I lurk behind him like a shadow, watching as he speaks with the dead through the night.

*****

A familiar voice speaks to me, but it holds no trace of the sensitive, whining boy it belongs to. Insults string together with ease, his sharp tongue a perfect reflection of his brother. 

Glenn haunts me ever still, staring back at me behind the eyes of his younger brother, that frigid gaze unwavering just like the one that lurks within my dreams. He stares at me with that scornful look, begging, begging, demanding all from me just as everyone else does. Father, Stepmother, Glenn, Dedue… They all look at me the same. 

The Glenn that still breathes is no different.

_ The Dimitri I knew is dead _, he would lament behind practiced cruelty, but the Felix who died alongside him was never mentioned, never mourned. He was gone without a trace, just the same as Glenn. Why should I listen to a dead man who pretends to belong among the living?

I tend to the voices in my head, knowing that they would always care for me more than the living ever could.

I may be a dead man walking, but I know my place.

*****

As though grappled by a curse running through my veins, I can't look away from the pitiable creature that stands in his place. If I turn my gaze from him for even a second, that boar will finally lunge himself into the graves at his feet for good. A loathsome pit stirs in my stomach just from looking at him, but I still can't bear to live with that. I can't bear to coat my hands with his blood a second time.

"I told you so," lingers on my lips as the Professor approaches me, but I can't find the heart to voice the fire that blazes in my throat. "Fix it," bleeds onto my tongue instead. Fix it, bring back the man I once knew, before it's too late. I can't stand watching him rot like some dying animal anymore, but I can't tear my eyes away. I beg the Professor to grant the wish I can't see through myself, masking all the concern, the fear, the bothersome _ care _ that's tearing me apart underneath razor sharp demands. 

All I mean to ask is that you bring him back.

*****

Our paths cross day in and day out, but Felix has given up on trying to speak to me. Instead he lingers just out of earshot, speaking about me rather than to. "Fix it," I hear him spit at the Professor, his voice just barely rising above the sound of Father and Glenn jeering at my shoulder. I ignore his words. There are more important things to occupy my mind with than the ramblings of a stranger.

She is still out there, and that's all that matters. I will not rest until I have her head, and the voices will not leave until I've crushed every last bone in her wicked body beneath my boot. They must be set free. Oh, how they long to lay at peace at last, how they beg and demand their vengeance be upheld so that they may finally move on. I will take her life, even if it costs my own to do so.

To give my life for their sake would be the only end befitting of a monster like me.

*****

He's gone too far, too far for me to just keep standing by. He's heading for somewhere I can't follow, but I can't let him take another step out of reach. The boar needs to be leashed before he charges straight into the slaughterhouse, but I can't reach the collar strung around his neck.

Someone else do it, so I don't have to look at him anymore.

_ Please. _

*** * ***

Their destinies intersect, spinning, dancing, warring against each other with each parting of their blades like an agony truer than death. They look to each other, their gazes ever drawn together by an invisible thread, but they can no longer see one another when their eyes meet. One looks and longs to see the shadow of a young prince, still bright and vibrant and untouched by the gaping maw of the beast that looms behind him. The other sees only a ghost of a valiant knight gone too soon, his steely words flaying him, always demanding more, more, may he tear more of his life out of his still-beating chest and throw it at his feet. 

No matter how they wish to see one another again, the shadows cling too tightly. They cover their eyes, showing only what the phantoms in their hearts want them to see.

Ever intertwined they dance this maddened dance, neither able to escape as the whims of fate tumble beside them.

May the Goddess have mercy, and smile upon the day they meet eye to eye once again.

The sun catches up.


End file.
